“PlayStation 4K” and “Xbox Durango” will be key to Ultra HD adoption

Could the success of Ultra HD lie in the hands of console gamers?

Next-gen TV—with a 4K "Ultra HD" picture resolution—was this year's hot topic at CES. But its success may be in the hands of console gamers.

With leaked details of octal-core processor banks paired with 8GB of RAM, the PlayStation 4 "Orbis" is sounding powerful (just for comparison of RAM alone, the 8GB of system memory is roughly 32 times more than the current model). But to see where 4K comes in, it's worth taking a trip back seven years.

In 2005, very few people had an HDTV. According to one study, there were "as many" as 10 million homes with high-definition screens—globally. The problem, according to many commentators, was the lack of HD content: nobody wanted to buy an HDTV because there was little HD content; very little HD content was made because there were very few people to sell it to. Classic catch-22.

Then along came the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3. For many people (myself included) they were the first devices our houses played host to that could produce high-def content. They gave people a reason to buy an HDTV and that gave content producers reason to invest in the formats it supported.

That's about to happen all over again—the next battle is 4K Ultra HD, and every major television manufacturer at CES this year was showing off their best entrants into this arena.

But it's like déjà vu. Once again we have TV-makers showing off massive new television sets, but nobody seems to know where the content will come from. Even Sony's CEO Kaz Hirai has admitted to being nervous about committing to a disc-based format for 4K video distribution.

It's such perfect timing when you think about it. This year we're expecting to see the next generation of game consoles from Sony and Microsoft and it seems perfectly reasonable—in fact, I would go as far as to say inevitable—that these consoles will support 4K output and make Ultra HD desirable rather than just a passing fad.

It feels even more realistic when you consider how devoted Sony and Microsoft are to having their consoles as home entertainment hubs; both companies have been fearless in signing up everyone from Netflix to the BBC, Sky to LoveFilm, in order to make their console the de facto standard in living room media systems.

They have to focus on the high end of gaming (because Apple's eating the casual market) and the next-gen of television and media distribution.

How it will happen

I believe we will see 4K in consoles enjoy a staggered rollout. First, it will be all about the games. Not every game will be available in 4K, but all will likely be at 1080p and the console will upscale to 2K or 4K. Later, "Play in Ultra HD" will become some sort of a marketing line, like "Better with Kinect" became for Microsoft and some of its motion-control games.

Further down the line, Sony will announce a 4K video-on-demand service, where films in Ultra HD can be downloaded to the console from the cloud. These movies already exist within studio walls, they just need a way of conveniently getting into the living room. A games console could be the doorway.

Within five years, all games on both consoles will be output at 4K resolutions and both Sony and Microsoft will become dominant players in the disc-free distribution of Ultra HD movies.

Today, it may seem like this is all about to happen too soon (how many people own a 4K TV today versus an HDTV in 2005?). But I think it's inevitable, and without 4K games consoles, the next generation of TV will suffer—Sony literally can't afford to let that happen.

313 Reader Comments

I know the reason I bought a PS3 over an Xbox 360 was for the Blu-Ray capability. At the time it was really the only player worth buying. I'm wasn't a hardcore enough gamer to have any of the other factors (exclusive titles etc) really count for more than that.

I'll be shocked if next-gen console games are consistently running at 1080p, let alone higher resolutions. I'm not one to say never, but I don't think 4K will be a factor at all in the next generation of consoles considering televisions that support it will be few and far between.

The only problem with discless Ultra HD movie distribution will be the DRM that is sure to accompany it. Also, being that 4k resolution is only needed for 80in or better screens, I see Bluray and 1080p gaming and movies being the defacto standard for quite some time.

The problem, to me, is that 4K is essentially irrelevant in most homes on most screen sizes. Other aspects of picture quality - colors, "refresh rates" and most DEFINITELY framerates mean significantly more than shoving more pixels into something where I wouldn't be able to tell the difference anyway. If I build a home movie theater, an 80-inch TV with 4K would be nice. That's about the only useful scenario.

I think the console that supports 4K as the default will be the loser this generation because it will be championing a feature very few will appreciate for at least another 5 years.

The only reason I think 4K adoption will occur, at all, is because early adopters will pay for 4K, and drive down prices for everyone else. Sony and Microsoft cannot afford to let their product be defined by early adopters, though, and have to target the mass market.

A 4K 'update' to the core product in 2016 makes more sense than a 4K console... Though knowing Microsoft, XBox 4K sounds too nice to pass.

The article mentions consoles were the first machine for many people that could display high def content.... Computers could do this since the mid 90s. This is the reason why i will always be a pc gamer, always 10 + years ahead in technology.

The problem, to me, is that 4K is essentially irrelevant in most homes on most screen sizes. Other aspects of picture quality - colors, "refresh rates" and most DEFINITELY framerates mean significantly more than shoving more pixels into something where I wouldn't be able to tell the difference anyway. If I build a home movie theater, an 80-inch TV with 4K would be nice. That's about the only useful scenario.

I agree completely, but you could say exactly the same thing about phones (add battery life into the mix while you're at it), but that doesn't stop the OMG 1080P SCREEN releases.

I am dubious. Given the shellacking Sony took last gen with their $500/$600 price point (people will just get another job to afford it!) - largely due to the inclusion of Blu-Ray - I have to think they're gun shy about making exactly the same mistake again.

Toss in the Wii's runaway success by keeping the console cheap (partially by not even doing HD), and I'm not sure where the up side to them is in trying to push yet another expensive new video format.

Admittedly, it wouldn't be such a tough row to hoe if MS also went that path - but I don't think MS is exactly champing at the bit to follow the PS3's plan, either.

Upscaling a 1080p game to 4K is one thing. Outputting a modern game natively in 4K is something entirely different. Sorry, but I just don't see that happening. Why? The current, top-of-the-line PC graphics cards aren't even powerful enough to do that for most modern games (unless you want to do SLI or Crossfire), and it's unlikely that the graphics capabilities of the next-gen consoles will be anywhere near their PC counterparts, given cost concerns.

If consoles do advertise 4K capabilities, it will be little more than a marketing gimmick designed to sell new TVs.

Having just bought a 1080p Panasonic plasma I'm in no hurry to be leap frogged by 4K games. That said I'm not holding my breath and look forward to higher quality visuals in games now that I can much better discern the lack of fidelity in the 360.

RAM is nice, but I really doubt either console will have a GPU powerful enough for native Ultra HD. If the GPU is 4 - 8 times as powerful as in the 360 and PS3 that's only good enough for smooth 1080p with full eye candy vs. the current low-quality upscaled 640p.

Consoles outputting 4K resolution games which even a 7970 with 2x the amount of power would struggle with is pretty laughable.

They probably will be able to do software decoding of H.265 for streaming 4K content at 15-25Mbps though whereas all other set top boxes have CPUs too weak to do such a thing (and hardware decoding of H.265 is still 18-24 months out, with the standard only just being finalized last week).

Good point. 4k content will probably be exclusive to your ISP's TV packages because of this. In my case, I'm not a potential customer anyway, as I'm using OTA antennae HD for my TV. Everything else is streamed from the "cloud" or from my home media server.

I'll be shocked if next-gen console games are consistently running at 1080p, let alone higher resolutions. I'm not one to say never, but I don't think 4K will be a factor at all in the next generation of consoles considering televisions that support it will be few and far between.

Yeeeep.

Actually, the headline made me do a double-take. And then I burst out laughing.

Give me a break. I have a machine with two GTX 670s (4GBs of VRAM each) and they still have trouble running current-gen games at 4k resolution. You can absolutely forget about running next-generation games at that resolution with anything resembling playable FPS!

This guy is an idiot. All the leaked specs for these consoles clearly shows that they barely have enough GPU power for doing consistent 1080p with hi-res testures and effects. They don't have near the power needed for pushing game graphics at 4K. Add in the prohibitive bandwidth usage and lack of physical disc standard, 4K video delivery also seems extremely unlikely to be any factor at all.

The coolest TVs I saw at CES were the autostereoscopic (3-D without glasses) ones. They looked great, had perfectly vibrant colors and didn't cause headaches or eye fatigue. I'm wondering if any of the next-gen game consoles will incorporate this technology.

Typo in the article. The PS3 has 512 MB of memory, split into two pools for 256 MB each for the CPU and GPU respectively. That would mean that 8 GB is sixteen times greater than the amount of memory currently in the PS3.

Another problem with this analysis is that it presumes that games will actually run at 4K resolution. There are very, very few games that natively run at 1920 x 1080 resolution on the Xbox 360 and PS3. The majority of games that support that resolution are scaled up from a lower resolution before being sent over HDMI. Only movies really take advantage of 1080p content on currently generation of consoles. Similarly I would expect only a minority of games on the next generation of console to support native 4K resolutions. The next generation of console hardware will certainly support that output resolution but the performance simply isn't there even on the PC side with mulitple GPU setup. The PC side getting close to getting 4k playable but anyone who is expecting that level of hardware in the next generation of consoles needs to reconsider their expectations. I'm expecting history to repeat itself with 4k output from next gen console to merely be scaled up 1080p native content for gaming.

I also would rather see them make TVs that can actually display 120 fps like a 120 hz computer monitor can. To my knowledge there is no such thing as a TV that operates at more than 60 hz, with interpolation added to make it look like 120 hz or more. I have a true 120 hz computer screen on my pc and it plays games so butter smooth. I would rather see a game on the console run at 120 fps on a true 120 hz TV than 4k res.

The coolest TVs I saw at CES were the autostereoscopic (3-D without glasses) ones. They looked great, had perfectly vibrant colors and didn't cause headaches or eye fatigue. I'm wondering if any of the next-gen game consoles will incorporate this technology.

3D format (passive, active, or autostereoscopic) is dependent on the TV, not the content. The content is always 2 separate images sent in a single frame.

As has been stated above, the hardware rumored for Orbis and Durango likely won't handle running games natively at 4K. They might be able to upscale to that resolution and thusly "support" a 4K TV, but 4K TVs will likely upscale content on their own.

And since both consoles are rumored to use 100GB quad-layer BluRay discs, I don't see how you're fitting a 4K movie on there.

Current HD consoles play games in 720p most of the time. I'll be very impressed if the coming generation can offer *actual 4K rendering* of mainstream titles at a reasonable framerate. We're talking about four times more pixels than 1080p, which current consoles can't even muster.

Yeah, maybe they'll be "capable" of 4K output, and this can be used by the system menus and games with "light" graphics --- like how today's consoles use their 1080p output --- but whether it will be used most of the time is another story.

I think we might be waiting another cycle for this to be a major factor for game consoles.

I also would rather see them make TVs that can actually display 120 fps like a 120 hz computer monitor can. To my knowledge there is no such thing as a TV that operates at more than 60 hz, with interpolation added to make it look like 120 hz or more. I have a true 120 hz computer screen on my pc and it plays games so butter smooth. I would rather see a game on the console run at 120 fps on a true 120 hz TV than 4k res.

There are TVs that operate at 120 and 240Hz, however they do not accept anything higher than 60Hz because the HDMI standard doesn't support it.

next gen consoles might do content in 4K but definitely NOT gaming. I would drool over the thought of an SLI being stuffed into a console box with the power to do smooth frame rates at 1080 let alone 4K.

HDTV had a huge confluence of beneficial factors that drove adoption:Switch from tubes to flat screens.Switch to essentially perfect resolution for normal home viewing distances.Government mandated switches to Digital TV around the world, driving HDTV broadcasts and eliminating SDTV broadcasts.Blu Ray arrived to coincide.

Now UHDTV has none of those factors going for it. For the vast majority of people it is just superfluous fluff.

Heck look at Blu Ray. 6+ years after launch and ~80% of movies on disk sold are still DVDs. For most people DVD is pretty close to already good enough, and Blu Ray is an extra expense increment. Where does that leave the even more expensive, smaller diminishing return of UHD?

As has been stated above, the hardware rumored for Orbis and Durango likely won't handle running games natively at 4K. They might be able to upscale to that resolution and thusly "support" a 4K TV, but 4K TVs will likely upscale content on their own.

And since both consoles are rumored to use 100GB quad-layer BluRay discs, I don't see how you're fitting a 4K movie on there.

H.265 supports double the compression quality of H.264, so expect a 4K video to only be double the size of a 25GB BluRay now.

HDTV had a huge confluence of beneficial factors that drove adoption:Switch from tubes to flat screens.Switch to essentially perfect resolution for normal home viewing distances.Government mandated switches to Digital TV around the world, driving HDTV broadcasts and eliminating SDTV broadcasts.Blu Ray arrived to coincide.

Now UHDTV has none of those factors going for it. For the vast majority of people it is just superfluous fluff.

Heck look at Blu Ray. 6+ years after launch and ~80% of movies on disk sold are still DVDs. For most people DVD is pretty close to already good enough, and Blu Ray is an extra expense increment. Where does that leave the even more expensive, smaller diminishing return of UHD?

As has been stated above, the hardware rumored for Orbis and Durango likely won't handle running games natively at 4K. They might be able to upscale to that resolution and thusly "support" a 4K TV, but 4K TVs will likely upscale content on their own.

And since both consoles are rumored to use 100GB quad-layer BluRay discs, I don't see how you're fitting a 4K movie on there.

Average movie takes up maybe 20GB encoded with H.264 on a 50GB Blu-ray disc. With 4x pixels in 4K movie but 2x efficiency using H.265 (finalized last week), it could reasonably fit on 50GB disc (and you'd have the extras on some other disc). Perfectly possible.

HDTV had a huge confluence of beneficial factors that drove adoption:Switch from tubes to flat screens.Switch to essentially perfect resolution for normal home viewing distances.Government mandated switches to Digital TV around the world, driving HDTV broadcasts and eliminating SDTV broadcasts.Blu Ray arrived to coincide.

Now UHDTV has none of those factors going for it. For the vast majority of people it is just superfluous fluff.

Heck look at Blu Ray. 6+ years after launch and ~80% of movies on disk sold are still DVDs. For most people DVD is pretty close to already good enough, and Blu Ray is an extra expense increment. Where does that leave the even more expensive, smaller diminishing return of UHD?

If people think a DVD looks anything near as good as a Bluray on a 60" HDTV, they need to get their eyes checked. Also, I wouldn't assume that the sales figures for disc-based movies (assuming they are true) mean people don't care about HD, especially in this era of Netflix, iTunes, and Amazon VOD streaming. Lack of intent to purchase a movie doesn't mean a person can't appreciate the quality difference.

2K is a film standard that is relatively close to 1080p TV content in terms of raw pixel count.

4K on the film side is also (but not exclusively) 4096 x 2160 even though most people are referring to 4k as 3840 x 2160. The terms ultra definition is being used more often since CES this year to describe 3840 x 2160 resolution so terms are slowly gaining distinction instead of being used interchangeably.

Typo in the article. The PS3 has 512 MB of memory, split into two pools for 256 MB each for the CPU and GPU respectively. That would mean that 8 GB is sixteen times greater than the amount of memory currently in the PS3.

For historical comparison both the PS2 and PS3 had 16 times the RAM of their predecessors too. But I don't expect 8GB this time. Maybe on the dev kit.

OrangeCream wrote:

enderandrew wrote:

As has been stated above, the hardware rumored for Orbis and Durango likely won't handle running games natively at 4K. They might be able to upscale to that resolution and thusly "support" a 4K TV, but 4K TVs will likely upscale content on their own.

And since both consoles are rumored to use 100GB quad-layer BluRay discs, I don't see how you're fitting a 4K movie on there.

H.265 supports double the compression quality of H.264, so expect a 4K video to only be double the size of a 25GB BluRay now.

BluRay uses more space than it has to because of the low profile of h.264 used. The REDplayer, for instance, does 4k in a 25GB file with their own wavelet-based format.